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Not about Alester. Not about what he’s capable of. Not about the fact that if I’m right, he won’t make this easy for either of us.

So I give her the part she can live with.

“I mean that if the child is his, then this remains what you chose. If it’s mine, it becomes something else. And I don’t think I’m ready for that.”

“Right,” she says again, softer now. “That’s what I thought.”

She turns toward the door.

This is the point where I should stop her. I know that.

I know how these moments work. The right thing is to say something, to move, to catch her hand, to force the conversation to stay alive long enough for the truth underneath it to surface.

But I don’t.

Because I can still see her face when I said it. Because she looked at me like I had reached into her and pulled something from inside her and left her bleeding.

Because if I stop her now, it will be for me. And she has had enough done to her for other people’s reasons.

So I let her go.

She reaches the door, opens it, and pauses for half a second with her hand on the knob.

I think she might look back. She doesn’t.

Then she’s gone. The door closes quietly behind her.

I stand there for a moment longer than makes sense, looking at the space she was standing in, as if there might still be some version of the conversation left there waiting to be salvaged.

But there isn’t. It’s all over.

Chapter Twenty-Three

MAGGIE

By the time Nate gets to my apartment, I’ve already changed twice, thrown out half a cup of cold coffee, and checked my phone so many times it no longer feels like a choice.

I’m waiting for results.

It feels like my whole life is sitting in some lab, being looked at by strangers.

When Nate knocks, I open the door before he can do it again.

He takes one look at me and says, “You look awful.”

“Thank you.”

“I don’t mean ugly.”

“Wow. Strong recovery.”

His mouth almost moves, but not enough to count as a smile. He steps inside, shuts the door behind him, and stands there with his hands in his pockets, looking around my apartment like it personally offended him for keeping secrets with me.

“You should have told me,” he says.

No hello. No easing into it. Just that.

I nod once. “I know.”